CapRadio Readshttp://www.capradio.org/readshttps://www.capradio.org/media/10423608/CapRadioReads_1400.pnghttp://www.capradio.orgTue, 14 Aug 2018 21:34:00 GMTFeed your curiosity and explore fresh perspectives with CapRadio Reads—our online, on-air and on demand resource for discovering your next great read.en-USCopyright 2018, Capital Public RadioCPR RSS Generator 2.0120noCapital Public RadioFeed your curiosity and explore fresh perspectives with CapRadio Reads—our online, on-air and on demand resource for discovering your next great read.Feed your curiosity and explore fresh perspectives with CapRadio Reads—our online, on-air and on demand resource for discovering your next great read.Capital Public Radio, CPR, KXJZ, KXPR, Sacramento Capital Public Radio: Capital Public RadioCopyright 2018, Capital Public RadioCapital Public Radio, CPR, KXJZ, KXPR, Sacramento Capital Public Radio: Capital Public RadioArts/Literaturewebmaster@capradio.orgCapRadioReadshttps://feedburner.google.comSubscribe with FeedlySubscribe with Bitty BrowserSubscribe with Daily RotationRobin Sloan - SourdoughRobin Sloan pokes fun at Silicon Valley’s robots and flavorless protein drinks in his second book, "Sourdough." It’s the perfect title for a book about various cultures in and around the Bay Area. And there are plenty of them: food culture, Saturday morning market culture, technology culture, and, of course, sourdough bread culture.

The book is about a young programmer named Lois who moves to California to work for a robotics company. She winds up becoming a part of the underground food world in San Francisco. When she starts using a robotic arm to help her make bread, it does make one wonder how far is too far when it comes to technology. Sloan joined CapRadio's Donna Apidone to discuss his fascination with technology.

Interview Highlights

You fit a robot into "Sourdough." Not a whole robot, just an arm. There’s a whole part that has to do with the fact that a robot can’t crack an egg. How important is that?

The reason people want robots to be able to crack eggs is that means that [task] can now belong to that world of repetition and copying. But the reason maybe some folks are not interested in having a robot arm crack their eggs is that they don’t mind cracking their eggs every morning, or baking their bread. And I think that’s delicious actually; that tension between the scale, the ease, and the leverage of code and technology, and then this other world [in which] the point is to do it again, and do it again, and do it again yourself, as a human.

You managed a line that has just taken on a life of its own and you managed it on Page 5. It just seems to stop people in their tracks. People of a certain age are talking about this one sentence: “Here's a thing I believe about people my age: we are the children of Hogwarts and more than anything we just want to be sorted.” Let’s talk about that.

You know, honestly the thing that has been amazing — and this is very different even in the four or five years since my first novel came out — the way that books kind of travel around the Internet has changed quite a bit. And in particular, you can think of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter [as] kind of operating on little social objects. That's what they want.

Books that can offer little bits, little isolatable chunks that can then flow without context through these networks, tend to do very well. There's a totally cynical way of thinking about that which is that you could engineer your novel to be full of these pithy little remarks. But actually it's more fun and I think more interesting to just write a novel as best you can and then see after the fact what pops out.

That's such a passive line, that they "want to be sorted" and not sort things out themselves.

Yeah, I think it's true though. Actually I think you could substitute in almost any generation in that line, or any group of people, or just people generally. I think that was part of the powerful appeal of that story. And if folks don't know, it's a reference to the “Harry Potter” books. Early on in the very first “Harry Potter” book, young Harry encounters this artifact at the wizard school called the Sorting Hat, which does the most amazing thing: it tells you where you belong. And it tells you who your tribe is. And I think there's something just deeply compelling about that for anyone, everyone, of any age.

Have you been sorted?

Have I been sorted … well, yeah. I think my “Sorting Hat” wasn’t quite as neat as, you know, the magical top hat. Honestly, I think it was the public library. I think when I walked into the public library, however many years ago that was, in Troy, Michigan, where I grew up, I was like, "Oh yes, I understand now. This is where I belong." [Laughs]

Donna Apidone interviewed Robin Sloan on March 27, 2018.

]]>Robin Sloan pokes fun at Silicon Valley’s robots and flavorless protein drinks in his second book, "Sourdough." It’s the perfect title for a book about various cultures in and around the Bay Area. And there are plenty of them: food culture, Saturday morning market culture, technology culture, and, of course, sourdough bread culture.

The book is about a young programmer named Lois who moves to California to work for a robotics company. She winds up becoming a part of the underground food world in San Francisco. When she starts using a robotic arm to help her make bread, it does make one wonder how far is too far when it comes to technology. Sloan joined CapRadio's Donna Apidone to discuss his fascination with technology.

Interview Highlights

You fit a robot into "Sourdough." Not a whole robot, just an arm. There’s a whole part that has to do with the fact that a robot can’t crack an egg. How important is that?

The reason people want robots to be able to crack eggs is that means that [task] can now belong to that world of repetition and copying. But the reason maybe some folks are not interested in having a robot arm crack their eggs is that they don’t mind cracking their eggs every morning, or baking their bread. And I think that’s delicious actually; that tension between the scale, the ease, and the leverage of code and technology, and then this other world [in which] the point is to do it again, and do it again, and do it again yourself, as a human.

You managed a line that has just taken on a life of its own and you managed it on Page 5. It just seems to stop people in their tracks. People of a certain age are talking about this one sentence: “Here's a thing I believe about people my age: we are the children of Hogwarts and more than anything we just want to be sorted.” Let’s talk about that.

You know, honestly the thing that has been amazing — and this is very different even in the four or five years since my first novel came out — the way that books kind of travel around the Internet has changed quite a bit. And in particular, you can think of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter [as] kind of operating on little social objects. That's what they want.

Books that can offer little bits, little isolatable chunks that can then flow without context through these networks, tend to do very well. There's a totally cynical way of thinking about that which is that you could engineer your novel to be full of these pithy little remarks. But actually it's more fun and I think more interesting to just write a novel as best you can and then see after the fact what pops out.

That's such a passive line, that they "want to be sorted" and not sort things out themselves.

Yeah, I think it's true though. Actually I think you could substitute in almost any generation in that line, or any group of people, or just people generally. I think that was part of the powerful appeal of that story. And if folks don't know, it's a reference to the “Harry Potter” books. Early on in the very first “Harry Potter” book, young Harry encounters this artifact at the wizard school called the Sorting Hat, which does the most amazing thing: it tells you where you belong. And it tells you who your tribe is. And I think there's something just deeply compelling about that for anyone, everyone, of any age.

Have you been sorted?

Have I been sorted … well, yeah. I think my “Sorting Hat” wasn’t quite as neat as, you know, the magical top hat. Honestly, I think it was the public library. I think when I walked into the public library, however many years ago that was, in Troy, Michigan, where I grew up, I was like, "Oh yes, I understand now. This is where I belong." [Laughs]

Donna Apidone interviewed Robin Sloan on March 27, 2018.

]]>http://www.capradio.org/116240Fri, 15 Jun 2018 18:00:00 GMThttp://www.capradio.org/116240noAuthor Robin Sloan’s "Sourdough" explores the wacky worlds within the San Francisco Bay Area, from technology to sourdough bread.Robin Sloan pokes fun at Silicon Valley’s robots and flavorless protein drinks in his second book, "Sourdough." It’s the perfect title for a book about various cultures in and around the Bay Area. And there are plenty of them: food culture, Saturday morning market culture, technology culture, and, of course, sourdough bread culture.

The book is about a young programmer named Lois who moves to California to work for a robotics company. She winds up becoming a part of the underground food world in San Francisco. When she starts using a robotic arm to help her make bread, it does make one wonder how far is too far when it comes to technology. Sloan joined CapRadio's Donna Apidone to discuss his fascination with technology.

Interview Highlights

You fit a robot into "Sourdough." Not a whole robot, just an arm. There’s a whole part that has to do with the fact that a robot can’t crack an egg. How important is that?

The reason people want robots to be able to crack eggs is that means that [task] can now belong to that world of repetition and copying. But the reason maybe some folks are not interested in having a robot arm crack their eggs is that they don’t mind cracking their eggs every morning, or baking their bread. And I think that’s delicious actually; that tension between the scale, the ease, and the leverage of code and technology, and then this other world [in which] the point is to do it again, and do it again, and do it again yourself, as a human.

You managed a line that has just taken on a life of its own and you managed it on Page 5. It just seems to stop people in their tracks. People of a certain age are talking about this one sentence: “Here's a thing I believe about people my age: we are the children of Hogwarts and more than anything we just want to be sorted.” Let’s talk about that.

You know, honestly the thing that has been amazing — and this is very different even in the four or five years since my first novel came out — the way that books kind of travel around the Internet has changed quite a bit. And in particular, you can think of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter [as] kind of operating on little social objects. That's what they want.

Books that can offer little bits, little isolatable chunks that can then flow without context through these networks, tend to do very well. There's a totally cynical way of thinking about that which is that you could engineer your novel to be full of these pithy little remarks. But actually it's more fun and I think more interesting to just write a novel as best you can and then see after the fact what pops out.

That's such a passive line, that they "want to be sorted" and not sort things out themselves.

Yeah, I think it's true though. Actually I think you could substitute in almost any generation in that line, or any group of people, or just people generally. I think that was part of the powerful appeal of that story. And if folks don't know, it's a reference to the “Harry Potter” books. Early on in the very first “Harry Potter” book, young Harry encounters this artifact at the wizard school called the Sorting Hat, which does the most amazing thing: it tells you where you belong. And it tells you who your tribe is. And I think there's something just deeply compelling about that for anyone, everyone, of any age.

Have you been sorted?

Have I been sorted … well, yeah. I think my “Sorting Hat” wasn’t quite as neat as, you know, the magical top hat. Honestly, I think it was the public library. I think when I walked into the public library, however many years ago that was, in Troy, Michigan, where I grew up, I was like, "Oh yes, I understand now. This is where I belong." [Laughs]

Donna Apidone interviewed Robin Sloan on March 27, 2018.

]]>webmaster@capradio.orgwebmaster@capradio.orgShanthi Sekaran - Lucky BoyTens of thousands of undocumented women have made the journey across the southern border of the United States. The trip is expensive. Some migrants are raped by guides or fellow travelers. That was Soli’s story in the novel "Lucky Boy," by author Shanthi Sekaran.

Soli arrives in the U.S. pregnant and tries to juggle motherhood and work as a nanny in Berkeley, California. When immigration agents find out about her, she’s faced with deportation and possibly being forced to relinquish her child to adoption. That’s when her path crosses with an Indian-American couple wanting to adopt. Soli may have to accept that someone else could love her child.

Through the story of one "Lucky Boy," Sekaran explores the complexities of U.S. immigration and adoption policies. She sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

Why is this boy "lucky"?

He's lucky in a very sincere way because he is loved very much by these two mothers and by Rishi [his foster mother's husband]. So, in that he's lucky, you know, he's wanted. But also there's some irony in that. [He’s] lucky because he doesn't know — people don't know where he's going to end up. His fate is sort of thrown to the wind because of this love, because of these people who have had him and who want him.

The book is named for the child. How do you get from these people who are very integrated into each other's lives and still keep that focus on the child at all times? How do you get all that on paper?

It's all about the child really. It's about an unborn child. It's about Ignacio, the son of Soli. Rishi has a line where he says, "That's all people want. They just want healthy babies." So that's what the people in the novel all kind of center around, whether they know it or not. They're distracted by all these other things but I think the core of the book is Ignacio.

You wrote a piece for The New York Times late last year called "The Privileged Immigrant" and you said that Indians are different in coming to the U.S. because they have a path. Can you talk about that?

Yeah. So this piece I wrote for The New York Times talked a little about my parents and the fact that they were brought over. They came over to the U.S. in the mid ‘60s because the U.S. was recruiting foreign medical graduates. And so it was very hard for them. They were up in Albany, New York. You know I think around 1960 there were like a total of 12,000 Indians in the entire United States. So it was a lonely experience and it was physically cold and it was probably emotionally very isolated.

My point was that my parents and South Asians of their generation, especially who were brought over on things like the foreign medical graduate program, were given a visa. They were given a training program to be in here. My father and mother were given an apartment in Albany. It was very hard but they had these little steps put in place for them that allowed them to have a job, earn money, save money, create credit history. It allowed them to take the steps that they needed to take to establish a stable life in this country.

And now we have a lot of people in America who were not given this path. They work here. They make money. There are technically legal ways for an undocumented immigrant to start something like a bank account. But it's terrifying to walk into a bank, you know, if you're undocumented and you could be picked up at any moment, to walk into a bank and give them your name and be officially then on the record. So that has ramifications for generations. They don't save the money. They don't establish credit history. They cannot integrate themselves into the economy and into the system of succeeding the way that maybe my parents could.

Donna Apidone interviewed Shanthi Sekaran on Feb. 7, 2017.

]]>Tens of thousands of undocumented women have made the journey across the southern border of the United States. The trip is expensive. Some migrants are raped by guides or fellow travelers. That was Soli’s story in the novel "Lucky Boy," by author Shanthi Sekaran.

Soli arrives in the U.S. pregnant and tries to juggle motherhood and work as a nanny in Berkeley, California. When immigration agents find out about her, she’s faced with deportation and possibly being forced to relinquish her child to adoption. That’s when her path crosses with an Indian-American couple wanting to adopt. Soli may have to accept that someone else could love her child.

Through the story of one "Lucky Boy," Sekaran explores the complexities of U.S. immigration and adoption policies. She sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

Why is this boy "lucky"?

He's lucky in a very sincere way because he is loved very much by these two mothers and by Rishi [his foster mother's husband]. So, in that he's lucky, you know, he's wanted. But also there's some irony in that. [He’s] lucky because he doesn't know — people don't know where he's going to end up. His fate is sort of thrown to the wind because of this love, because of these people who have had him and who want him.

The book is named for the child. How do you get from these people who are very integrated into each other's lives and still keep that focus on the child at all times? How do you get all that on paper?

It's all about the child really. It's about an unborn child. It's about Ignacio, the son of Soli. Rishi has a line where he says, "That's all people want. They just want healthy babies." So that's what the people in the novel all kind of center around, whether they know it or not. They're distracted by all these other things but I think the core of the book is Ignacio.

You wrote a piece for The New York Times late last year called "The Privileged Immigrant" and you said that Indians are different in coming to the U.S. because they have a path. Can you talk about that?

Yeah. So this piece I wrote for The New York Times talked a little about my parents and the fact that they were brought over. They came over to the U.S. in the mid ‘60s because the U.S. was recruiting foreign medical graduates. And so it was very hard for them. They were up in Albany, New York. You know I think around 1960 there were like a total of 12,000 Indians in the entire United States. So it was a lonely experience and it was physically cold and it was probably emotionally very isolated.

My point was that my parents and South Asians of their generation, especially who were brought over on things like the foreign medical graduate program, were given a visa. They were given a training program to be in here. My father and mother were given an apartment in Albany. It was very hard but they had these little steps put in place for them that allowed them to have a job, earn money, save money, create credit history. It allowed them to take the steps that they needed to take to establish a stable life in this country.

And now we have a lot of people in America who were not given this path. They work here. They make money. There are technically legal ways for an undocumented immigrant to start something like a bank account. But it's terrifying to walk into a bank, you know, if you're undocumented and you could be picked up at any moment, to walk into a bank and give them your name and be officially then on the record. So that has ramifications for generations. They don't save the money. They don't establish credit history. They cannot integrate themselves into the economy and into the system of succeeding the way that maybe my parents could.

Donna Apidone interviewed Shanthi Sekaran on Feb. 7, 2017.

]]>http://www.capradio.org/116239Fri, 15 Jun 2018 17:44:00 GMThttp://www.capradio.org/116239noAuthor Shanthi Sekaran explores the complexities of U.S. immigration and adoption policies through the story of one "Lucky Boy." Tens of thousands of undocumented women have made the journey across the southern border of the United States. The trip is expensive. Some migrants are raped by guides or fellow travelers. That was Soli’s story in the novel "Lucky Boy," by author Shanthi Sekaran.

Soli arrives in the U.S. pregnant and tries to juggle motherhood and work as a nanny in Berkeley, California. When immigration agents find out about her, she’s faced with deportation and possibly being forced to relinquish her child to adoption. That’s when her path crosses with an Indian-American couple wanting to adopt. Soli may have to accept that someone else could love her child.

Through the story of one "Lucky Boy," Sekaran explores the complexities of U.S. immigration and adoption policies. She sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

Why is this boy "lucky"?

He's lucky in a very sincere way because he is loved very much by these two mothers and by Rishi [his foster mother's husband]. So, in that he's lucky, you know, he's wanted. But also there's some irony in that. [He’s] lucky because he doesn't know — people don't know where he's going to end up. His fate is sort of thrown to the wind because of this love, because of these people who have had him and who want him.

The book is named for the child. How do you get from these people who are very integrated into each other's lives and still keep that focus on the child at all times? How do you get all that on paper?

It's all about the child really. It's about an unborn child. It's about Ignacio, the son of Soli. Rishi has a line where he says, "That's all people want. They just want healthy babies." So that's what the people in the novel all kind of center around, whether they know it or not. They're distracted by all these other things but I think the core of the book is Ignacio.

You wrote a piece for The New York Times late last year called "The Privileged Immigrant" and you said that Indians are different in coming to the U.S. because they have a path. Can you talk about that?

Yeah. So this piece I wrote for The New York Times talked a little about my parents and the fact that they were brought over. They came over to the U.S. in the mid ‘60s because the U.S. was recruiting foreign medical graduates. And so it was very hard for them. They were up in Albany, New York. You know I think around 1960 there were like a total of 12,000 Indians in the entire United States. So it was a lonely experience and it was physically cold and it was probably emotionally very isolated.

My point was that my parents and South Asians of their generation, especially who were brought over on things like the foreign medical graduate program, were given a visa. They were given a training program to be in here. My father and mother were given an apartment in Albany. It was very hard but they had these little steps put in place for them that allowed them to have a job, earn money, save money, create credit history. It allowed them to take the steps that they needed to take to establish a stable life in this country.

And now we have a lot of people in America who were not given this path. They work here. They make money. There are technically legal ways for an undocumented immigrant to start something like a bank account. But it's terrifying to walk into a bank, you know, if you're undocumented and you could be picked up at any moment, to walk into a bank and give them your name and be officially then on the record. So that has ramifications for generations. They don't save the money. They don't establish credit history. They cannot integrate themselves into the economy and into the system of succeeding the way that maybe my parents could.

Donna Apidone interviewed Shanthi Sekaran on Feb. 7, 2017.

]]>webmaster@capradio.orgwebmaster@capradio.orgJohn Lescroart - FatalAuthor John Lescroart’s 28th book, "Fatal," is centered around a massive, deadly terrorist attack in San Francisco. There’s no sign of the usual main characters from many of his other thrillers: lawyer Dismas Hardy and Abe Glitsky.

Instead, he writes from the perspective of a new character: Sergeant Beth Tully, a homicide inspector for the San Francisco Police Department dealing with the aftermath of the attack. "Fatal" explores the complex ways that humans cope with trauma in the wake of disaster. Lescroart sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

This is very much a book about unfinished business in a lot of different ways. In fact, there's one line that you wrote: “Could you build a life on a basic falsehood?” And I found myself being suspicious, maybe more so than [in] your other books, very suspicious of everybody who came into the book.

Well this is the difference between writing what I started to write and a traditional mystery where I knew the playground of people that I was working with. This book does not have that particular playground of people. It's a whole group of people who I'd never met before and I had to find and get comfortable with but also within the general context of the story I had guys who were, I thought, fascinating.

They were fascinating but you didn't know, I didn't know, what they were going to do. And they say that if, you know, you can write a book that surprises the author, then the readers are going to be surprised.

There were a number of emotional dilemmas that people in the book faced. You dealt very openly with anorexia. I think you've said you described it better than you knew when you were writing.

I had written a scene about anorexia. I know nothing about anorexia, other than what we all do.I had this moment in the story that I wanted to have something happen to [a character] that was dramatic and serious. And so I had her go into a very serious medical state where she had to get 911 called, taken to the hospital. And I called up a social worker and she explained this thing called the refeeding syndrome. That was exactly what happened in the book. Exactly. I mean I didn't have to change a word other than to acknowledge what it was. And you know that's the kind of thing that happens all the time in these books — that you realize you're kind of onto something that's majorly correct even if you don't really know why.

There was also a big part for PTSD. [It] applied to so many of the characters. Everyone reacted in different ways and that's what PTSD is: a lot of different reactions that even the people involved don't recognize that they are going through or acting out.

Well it's because of major trauma. And that is in the center of this book. In fact, it's the main thing in the book, from my perspective anyway. It’s what makes the whole city go haywire. And in fact, what makes the world that we're living in go haywire. We're all going a little bit nuts, because it's a hard time.

Donna Apidone interviewed John Lescroart on June 13, 2017.

]]>Author John Lescroart’s 28th book, "Fatal," is centered around a massive, deadly terrorist attack in San Francisco. There’s no sign of the usual main characters from many of his other thrillers: lawyer Dismas Hardy and Abe Glitsky.

Instead, he writes from the perspective of a new character: Sergeant Beth Tully, a homicide inspector for the San Francisco Police Department dealing with the aftermath of the attack. "Fatal" explores the complex ways that humans cope with trauma in the wake of disaster. Lescroart sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

This is very much a book about unfinished business in a lot of different ways. In fact, there's one line that you wrote: “Could you build a life on a basic falsehood?” And I found myself being suspicious, maybe more so than [in] your other books, very suspicious of everybody who came into the book.

Well this is the difference between writing what I started to write and a traditional mystery where I knew the playground of people that I was working with. This book does not have that particular playground of people. It's a whole group of people who I'd never met before and I had to find and get comfortable with but also within the general context of the story I had guys who were, I thought, fascinating.

They were fascinating but you didn't know, I didn't know, what they were going to do. And they say that if, you know, you can write a book that surprises the author, then the readers are going to be surprised.

There were a number of emotional dilemmas that people in the book faced. You dealt very openly with anorexia. I think you've said you described it better than you knew when you were writing.

I had written a scene about anorexia. I know nothing about anorexia, other than what we all do.I had this moment in the story that I wanted to have something happen to [a character] that was dramatic and serious. And so I had her go into a very serious medical state where she had to get 911 called, taken to the hospital. And I called up a social worker and she explained this thing called the refeeding syndrome. That was exactly what happened in the book. Exactly. I mean I didn't have to change a word other than to acknowledge what it was. And you know that's the kind of thing that happens all the time in these books — that you realize you're kind of onto something that's majorly correct even if you don't really know why.

There was also a big part for PTSD. [It] applied to so many of the characters. Everyone reacted in different ways and that's what PTSD is: a lot of different reactions that even the people involved don't recognize that they are going through or acting out.

Well it's because of major trauma. And that is in the center of this book. In fact, it's the main thing in the book, from my perspective anyway. It’s what makes the whole city go haywire. And in fact, what makes the world that we're living in go haywire. We're all going a little bit nuts, because it's a hard time.

Donna Apidone interviewed John Lescroart on June 13, 2017.

]]>http://www.capradio.org/116234Fri, 15 Jun 2018 17:41:00 GMThttp://www.capradio.org/116234noAuthor John Lescroart discusses his 28th novel, "Fatal," and the plot twist that he says even he was surprised by.Author John Lescroart’s 28th book, "Fatal," is centered around a massive, deadly terrorist attack in San Francisco. There’s no sign of the usual main characters from many of his other thrillers: lawyer Dismas Hardy and Abe Glitsky.

Instead, he writes from the perspective of a new character: Sergeant Beth Tully, a homicide inspector for the San Francisco Police Department dealing with the aftermath of the attack. "Fatal" explores the complex ways that humans cope with trauma in the wake of disaster. Lescroart sat down with CapRadio's Donna Apidone to talk about it.

Interview Highlights

This is very much a book about unfinished business in a lot of different ways. In fact, there's one line that you wrote: “Could you build a life on a basic falsehood?” And I found myself being suspicious, maybe more so than [in] your other books, very suspicious of everybody who came into the book.

Well this is the difference between writing what I started to write and a traditional mystery where I knew the playground of people that I was working with. This book does not have that particular playground of people. It's a whole group of people who I'd never met before and I had to find and get comfortable with but also within the general context of the story I had guys who were, I thought, fascinating.

They were fascinating but you didn't know, I didn't know, what they were going to do. And they say that if, you know, you can write a book that surprises the author, then the readers are going to be surprised.

There were a number of emotional dilemmas that people in the book faced. You dealt very openly with anorexia. I think you've said you described it better than you knew when you were writing.

I had written a scene about anorexia. I know nothing about anorexia, other than what we all do.I had this moment in the story that I wanted to have something happen to [a character] that was dramatic and serious. And so I had her go into a very serious medical state where she had to get 911 called, taken to the hospital. And I called up a social worker and she explained this thing called the refeeding syndrome. That was exactly what happened in the book. Exactly. I mean I didn't have to change a word other than to acknowledge what it was. And you know that's the kind of thing that happens all the time in these books — that you realize you're kind of onto something that's majorly correct even if you don't really know why.

There was also a big part for PTSD. [It] applied to so many of the characters. Everyone reacted in different ways and that's what PTSD is: a lot of different reactions that even the people involved don't recognize that they are going through or acting out.

Well it's because of major trauma. And that is in the center of this book. In fact, it's the main thing in the book, from my perspective anyway. It’s what makes the whole city go haywire. And in fact, what makes the world that we're living in go haywire. We're all going a little bit nuts, because it's a hard time.

Donna Apidone interviewed John Lescroart on June 13, 2017.

]]>webmaster@capradio.orgwebmaster@capradio.orgElizabeth Rynecki - Chasing PortraitsThe Nazis were famous for raiding and ruining art collections throughout Europe during World War II. Author Elizabeth Rynecki’s great-grandfather Moshe Rynecki was a Jewish artist in Poland who created hundreds of paintings depicting everyday life. Moshe distributed them so they wouldn’t be destroyed. He later died in a concentration camp, but his son George (Elizabeth’s grandfather) survived and wrote a memoir.

"Chasing Portraits" is Elizabeth Rynecki’s story of trying to track down her great-grandfather’s paintings and piece together the rest of her family’s history. She spoke with CapRadio's Donna Apidone about her quest and the book that resulted from it.

Interview Highlights

I want to talk about two individuals and something that occurred between them: Moshe died in a concentration camp but he made decisions that led him there, whereas his son George made a different set of decisions that led him to a different place.

Moshe decided he wanted to be in the ghetto in the 1940s when the Nazis built the Warsaw ghetto. Over 400,000 Jews were ultimately in the ghetto, which was about 1.3 square miles, which if you go home and measure that for your own city and think about it, it's really a profound number. But I think he felt very torn. He, I think, didn't trust the Germans [and] thought going into the ghetto was a bad idea. But I think that he felt compelled to be with his people. And my great grandfather and my Grandpa George had a phone call, and my Grandpa George said, “I can get you out.” And my great grandfather said, “No I'm going to stay in the ghetto, and if it's death, so be it.”

Things in life happen in a linear fashion, but memories hardly ever do. So, Grandpa George wrote them down as he thought of them. A lot of that message, he made very clear, was for you to know. Not so much for your dad, not so much for anyone else, but he specifically identified it being for you. Talk about that responsibility.

For those of you not familiar with the quote, basically what Grandpa George said in the memoir is, “I'm writing this down and there are a lot of survivors who are writing these things down. And I don't care, I'm writing them anyway. And I'm writing them if, for no other reason than for my granddaughter Elizabeth to know and not to be afraid of the truth.” …I can still sort of feel a [weight] on my shoulders. And it’s a huge responsibility as well.

Why?

So, in 1992 when he died … To me survivors could bear witness and everybody else could listen. But that was kind of it. And I didn't know what the heck I was supposed to do with that. He was gone. I didn't understand what my relationship to that history was. It wasn't my history. I didn't have to process it. But I realized that survivors were going to start dying. And so it was some point between my dad self-publishing Grandpa George's memoir, building the website, discovering more paintings had survived the war and wondering what had happened to the other 700. And suddenly pieces just started to come into shape. And I realized that the paintings were survivors. And that they couldn't speak, but I could tell their story. And that I was in a really unique position to tell their story.

And it's important to make that clear: you were not trying to claim these to say they're my family’s or my great grandfather’s. I want them back. That might have been your goal, but it's not your goal now.

Right. When I started this process I was really angry. That's me being very polite. I wanted the paintings back. This was ridiculous. My great grandfather's name was on them. He signed them. They were his. He was murdered and they belonged to my family. I started talking to a lot of people who were a lot smarter and a lot better informed about provenance research and laws and how this whole process works.

Artists give paintings away, they sell paintings, they trade them, they barter them. How could I prove that what somebody else had actually belonged to my family? And so it just became incredibly difficult. You're dealing with all sorts of stuff that's super complicated.

What is your goal?

My goal eventually became to be a historian to rescue my great grandfather's legacy. That to me seems more of a win. Having people aware of who my great grandfather was and what his art was and what it tells us about Polish Jews before the war seems to me more valuable than my having another painting to shove in a closet.

]]>The Nazis were famous for raiding and ruining art collections throughout Europe during World War II. Author Elizabeth Rynecki’s great-grandfather Moshe Rynecki was a Jewish artist in Poland who created hundreds of paintings depicting everyday life. Moshe distributed them so they wouldn’t be destroyed. He later died in a concentration camp, but his son George (Elizabeth’s grandfather) survived and wrote a memoir.

"Chasing Portraits" is Elizabeth Rynecki’s story of trying to track down her great-grandfather’s paintings and piece together the rest of her family’s history. She spoke with CapRadio's Donna Apidone about her quest and the book that resulted from it.

Interview Highlights

I want to talk about two individuals and something that occurred between them: Moshe died in a concentration camp but he made decisions that led him there, whereas his son George made a different set of decisions that led him to a different place.

Moshe decided he wanted to be in the ghetto in the 1940s when the Nazis built the Warsaw ghetto. Over 400,000 Jews were ultimately in the ghetto, which was about 1.3 square miles, which if you go home and measure that for your own city and think about it, it's really a profound number. But I think he felt very torn. He, I think, didn't trust the Germans [and] thought going into the ghetto was a bad idea. But I think that he felt compelled to be with his people. And my great grandfather and my Grandpa George had a phone call, and my Grandpa George said, “I can get you out.” And my great grandfather said, “No I'm going to stay in the ghetto, and if it's death, so be it.”

Things in life happen in a linear fashion, but memories hardly ever do. So, Grandpa George wrote them down as he thought of them. A lot of that message, he made very clear, was for you to know. Not so much for your dad, not so much for anyone else, but he specifically identified it being for you. Talk about that responsibility.

For those of you not familiar with the quote, basically what Grandpa George said in the memoir is, “I'm writing this down and there are a lot of survivors who are writing these things down. And I don't care, I'm writing them anyway. And I'm writing them if, for no other reason than for my granddaughter Elizabeth to know and not to be afraid of the truth.” …I can still sort of feel a [weight] on my shoulders. And it’s a huge responsibility as well.

Why?

So, in 1992 when he died … To me survivors could bear witness and everybody else could listen. But that was kind of it. And I didn't know what the heck I was supposed to do with that. He was gone. I didn't understand what my relationship to that history was. It wasn't my history. I didn't have to process it. But I realized that survivors were going to start dying. And so it was some point between my dad self-publishing Grandpa George's memoir, building the website, discovering more paintings had survived the war and wondering what had happened to the other 700. And suddenly pieces just started to come into shape. And I realized that the paintings were survivors. And that they couldn't speak, but I could tell their story. And that I was in a really unique position to tell their story.

And it's important to make that clear: you were not trying to claim these to say they're my family’s or my great grandfather’s. I want them back. That might have been your goal, but it's not your goal now.

Right. When I started this process I was really angry. That's me being very polite. I wanted the paintings back. This was ridiculous. My great grandfather's name was on them. He signed them. They were his. He was murdered and they belonged to my family. I started talking to a lot of people who were a lot smarter and a lot better informed about provenance research and laws and how this whole process works.

Artists give paintings away, they sell paintings, they trade them, they barter them. How could I prove that what somebody else had actually belonged to my family? And so it just became incredibly difficult. You're dealing with all sorts of stuff that's super complicated.

What is your goal?

My goal eventually became to be a historian to rescue my great grandfather's legacy. That to me seems more of a win. Having people aware of who my great grandfather was and what his art was and what it tells us about Polish Jews before the war seems to me more valuable than my having another painting to shove in a closet.

]]>http://www.capradio.org/116164Fri, 15 Jun 2018 17:40:00 GMThttp://www.capradio.org/116164noAuthor Elizabeth Rynecki shares the story behind her book "Chasing Portraits," which chronicles her attempt to track down her great-grandfather’s paintings that were hidden from the Nazis during World War II.The Nazis were famous for raiding and ruining art collections throughout Europe during World War II. Author Elizabeth Rynecki’s great-grandfather Moshe Rynecki was a Jewish artist in Poland who created hundreds of paintings depicting everyday life. Moshe distributed them so they wouldn’t be destroyed. He later died in a concentration camp, but his son George (Elizabeth’s grandfather) survived and wrote a memoir.

"Chasing Portraits" is Elizabeth Rynecki’s story of trying to track down her great-grandfather’s paintings and piece together the rest of her family’s history. She spoke with CapRadio's Donna Apidone about her quest and the book that resulted from it.

Interview Highlights

I want to talk about two individuals and something that occurred between them: Moshe died in a concentration camp but he made decisions that led him there, whereas his son George made a different set of decisions that led him to a different place.

Moshe decided he wanted to be in the ghetto in the 1940s when the Nazis built the Warsaw ghetto. Over 400,000 Jews were ultimately in the ghetto, which was about 1.3 square miles, which if you go home and measure that for your own city and think about it, it's really a profound number. But I think he felt very torn. He, I think, didn't trust the Germans [and] thought going into the ghetto was a bad idea. But I think that he felt compelled to be with his people. And my great grandfather and my Grandpa George had a phone call, and my Grandpa George said, “I can get you out.” And my great grandfather said, “No I'm going to stay in the ghetto, and if it's death, so be it.”

Things in life happen in a linear fashion, but memories hardly ever do. So, Grandpa George wrote them down as he thought of them. A lot of that message, he made very clear, was for you to know. Not so much for your dad, not so much for anyone else, but he specifically identified it being for you. Talk about that responsibility.

For those of you not familiar with the quote, basically what Grandpa George said in the memoir is, “I'm writing this down and there are a lot of survivors who are writing these things down. And I don't care, I'm writing them anyway. And I'm writing them if, for no other reason than for my granddaughter Elizabeth to know and not to be afraid of the truth.” …I can still sort of feel a [weight] on my shoulders. And it’s a huge responsibility as well.

Why?

So, in 1992 when he died … To me survivors could bear witness and everybody else could listen. But that was kind of it. And I didn't know what the heck I was supposed to do with that. He was gone. I didn't understand what my relationship to that history was. It wasn't my history. I didn't have to process it. But I realized that survivors were going to start dying. And so it was some point between my dad self-publishing Grandpa George's memoir, building the website, discovering more paintings had survived the war and wondering what had happened to the other 700. And suddenly pieces just started to come into shape. And I realized that the paintings were survivors. And that they couldn't speak, but I could tell their story. And that I was in a really unique position to tell their story.

And it's important to make that clear: you were not trying to claim these to say they're my family’s or my great grandfather’s. I want them back. That might have been your goal, but it's not your goal now.

Right. When I started this process I was really angry. That's me being very polite. I wanted the paintings back. This was ridiculous. My great grandfather's name was on them. He signed them. They were his. He was murdered and they belonged to my family. I started talking to a lot of people who were a lot smarter and a lot better informed about provenance research and laws and how this whole process works.

Artists give paintings away, they sell paintings, they trade them, they barter them. How could I prove that what somebody else had actually belonged to my family? And so it just became incredibly difficult. You're dealing with all sorts of stuff that's super complicated.

What is your goal?

My goal eventually became to be a historian to rescue my great grandfather's legacy. That to me seems more of a win. Having people aware of who my great grandfather was and what his art was and what it tells us about Polish Jews before the war seems to me more valuable than my having another painting to shove in a closet.

]]>webmaster@capradio.orgwebmaster@capradio.orgTrailer: Introducing The CapRadio Reads Podcast With Donna ApidoneGain insight into your favorite writer or discover your next great read on the new CapRadio Reads podcast. CapRadio’s Morning Edition Host Donna Apidone sits down with prominent authors and fresh writers. Subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts.]]>Gain insight into your favorite writer or discover your next great read on the new CapRadio Reads podcast. CapRadio’s Morning Edition Host Donna Apidone sits down with prominent authors and fresh writers. Subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts.]]>http://www.capradio.org/115908Mon, 11 Jun 2018 16:25:00 GMThttp://www.capradio.org/115908noFeed your curiosity and explore fresh perspectives with Capital Public Radio’s new podcast for book lovers.Gain insight into your favorite writer or discover your next great read on the new CapRadio Reads podcast. CapRadio’s Morning Edition Host Donna Apidone sits down with prominent authors and fresh writers. Subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Google Play or wherever you get your podcasts.]]>webmaster@capradio.orgwebmaster@capradio.orgCapital Public RadiononadultFeed your curiosity and explore fresh perspectives with CapRadio Reads—our online, on-air and on demand resource for discovering your next great read.